India General Surgeon

After a period of waiting, the general surgeon made his entrance. His good point was that he freely talked to us about the Indian health care system and the common health problems in India. He said that the most common health concern in India was infectious disease, a lot of which is caused by poor hygiene and contaminated water. Another major health problem is diabetes (I couldn't ascertain exactly why it was so prevalent.) He said that patients taking 200-300 units of insulin a day was not uncommon. For those health professional reading this, I couldn't determine if this was long or short acting insulin. Cancer is also a big problem. He said the most common cancer was oral cancer because chewing paan or betel leaves was so prevalent. Another interesting thing he said was that Indians do not want reconstruction after cancer surgery (i.e. mastectomies.) Again, I could not understand his speech enough to ascertain the reason.

His not so good point was his lack of a bedside manner, extreme even compared to those physicians we know in the United States that could use lessons in compassion. In his defense, I'm finding out that his attitude is prevalent among physicians in India; perhaps it's cultural or perhaps it's training, or a mixture of both. When he examined a woman who was to have a lipectomy the next day, he grapped her adominal fat and kept shaking it in front of us saying, "This is what happens when they eat too much rice!" I was appalled; the woman kept a flat look on her face. When another older woman came in and laid on the table, he suddenly pulled down her sorry and started pointing at her mastectomy site. "Come closer, she won't mind!" Then he started jabbing at her chest showing us her scar. After she got off the table and was sitting waiting for instructions, the doctor totally ignored her and her daughter who accompanied her and spent time chatting with us about places we should visit. Oh my.

The last thing we observed before we left the hospital was a man who had gangrene of his foot because of diabetes. He has been an inpatient in the hospital for while. The doctor stated that this man's big toe needs to be amputated in order to prevent further infection, but the man and his wife are refusing. The doctor seemed to me to indicate that it was just because of ignorance. I wish that I could find out what this family's fears are regarding amputation.

After Aneesh's and my hospital stint, we came back to the guest house and had another wonderful Indian dinner: rice, mixed vegetables, shredded beets, crispy flat bread. For dessert, Stephen bought us individual servings of India style ice cream. The ice cream came in a small clay pot and was flavored with cardamon with pistachios sprinkled on top. It tasted wonderful.